Paul
Goble
Staunton, March 21 – In a move that
perfectly embodies the “hybrid” way the Putin regime does things, the FSB has
announced that it is declassifying documents concerning the trial and execution
of Admiral Kolchak, the anti-Bolshevik leader in Siberia in 1919-1920, but will
not allow anyone in the public to have access to them.
The declassification of these
documents will no doubt be invoked by Putin’s supporters in Russia and abroad
as evidence of a new openness by the Russian security services, but the simultaneous
decision to block access to these unclassified documents ill ensure that in fact
nothing has really changed, although the latter point is not one Moscow will be
making.
Kommersant
reported this development today (kommersant.ru/doc/3917226),
and opposition sites picked up on it, suggesting that it is the latest example
of how the Putin regime can be counted on to act (e.g., echo.msk.ru/news/2392797-echo.html and graniru.org/Society/History/m.275624.html).
But the upshot of the FSB’s action may
be exactly the reverse of what it hopes for: more interest in Kolchak and his
rehabilitation (rusk.ru/newsdata.php?idar=84008
and beloedelo.com/actual/actual/?508)
and more questions among Russians about how long they will have to wait to
learn the truth about their own past.
As one Russian specialist on Soviet
history puts it, “How long must we wait until we can be acquainted with [documents
concerning Kolchak and other victims of Soviet power]? Another hundred years?
Or even 300?” Such questions by their very nature are subversive of the values
Putin wants to promote.
And that makes the FSB’s actions
truly counterproductive. If the organs and the Kremlin behind them didn’t want
to release anything, they should have left things as they were, with the documents
beyond reach because of classification. But in the pursuit of positive reviews
from some, they have generated more negative ones by far more people.
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